Judith G. M. Rosmalen

TL;DR: Research designs are described that discriminate the remaining models and plea for deconstruction of neuroticism, finding that Neuroticism is etiologically not informative yet but useful as an efficient marker of non-specified general risk.

TL;DR: It is put forward that a three-generation design is the optimal approach to investigate multifactorial diseases, and LifeLines is a study based on these concepts, which will contribute to the understanding of how universal risk factors are modified to influence the individual susceptibility to multifactors diseases, not only at one stage of life but cumulatively over time: the lifeline.

TL;DR: Neuroticism is not an explanatory concept in the aetiology of psychopathology, since it measures a person’s characteristic level of distress over a protracted period of time, and this situation will not change until knowledge becomes available about the mechanisms that produce high neuroticism scores and its neurobiological substrate.

TL;DR: It is suggested that season of sampling and gender may act as potential confounders in the cortisol-psychopathology relationship in this age group, and a wide interindividual variability in HPA-axis function is found.

TL;DR: The neural evidence matches the psychological findings, which associate N with a negative bias in attention, interpretation and recall of information, increased reactivity, and ineffective coping, and is consistent with findings of decreased cardiovascular flexibility.